All Share Services

We’ve been writing a lot about the conspiracy theories surrounding the Sandy Hook school shooting — some say too much. “Why you’re giving these Sandy Hook truther media whores the time of day. Ignore them and they go away [sic],” one reader emailed.

Unfortunately, that’s probably not the case. The genie is already out of the bottle and this myth will likely only heat up as the debate over gun control does. “It’s by far the hottest topic of the moment,” David Mikkelson, the co-founder of the myth-debunking website Snopes.com told BuzzFeed. As the site’s Ben Smith and CJ Lotz wrote today, “Some of the factors that can bring theories in from the fringe appear to be driving its unexpected surge this month: A connection to America’s intensely polarized political culture in general, and a message that appeals to a longstanding fear among gun owners, in particular.”

“This has gone super viral. It even surprised me how crazy insane the interest in this stuff is,” Paul Joseph Watson, a guest host for conspiracy theorist Alex Jones’ radio show, said today.

And thanks to the Internet, the media can no longer suffocate a smoldering conspiracy theory by ignoring it. ”The biggest problem for theorists was always getting their message out,” Robert Goldberg, a University of Utah historian who studies conspiracy theories, told Salon. “The Internet has completely changed that. Often, they don’t even bother trying to get their theories in the mainstream media anymore.” So even if the the few media outlets that have covered the theories give them a bit more exposure, it’s unlikely conspiracists would have a problem reaching their audience on their own anyway.

The most popular video on YouTube, “The Sandy Hook Shooting – Fully Exposed,” produced by ThinkOutsideTheTV, already has nearly 11 million views. There are at least 40 other Sandy Hook conspiracy theory videos on YouTube with over 100,000 views. Alex Jones’ conspiracy websites, which get 11 million visitors a month, are publishing new stories about the Newtown massacre every day.

Mentions of “Sandy Hook hoax” have exploded on Twitter in the past week. This graph shows the spike in Google searches for “Sandy Hook hoax,” which mostly come from conservative states like Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, Oklahoma and Kentucky:

Then there’s the increasing flirtation with the hoax theory among presumably credible people. On top of Florida Atlantic University professor James Tracy, and popular Ohio TV anchor Ben Swann, there’s Denard Span, a centerfielder for the Washington Nationals. He tweeted this week, “I was watching some controversial stuff on YouTube about the sandy hooks thing today! It really makes u think and wonder.” (He later apologized and walked back his comments.)

One reason for the explosive growth of the movement is that it builds on existing conspiracy theories, especially classic “black helicopters” anti-government paranoia and theories surrounding 9/11. Not only do Sandy Hook truthers share an epistemological foundation with existing theorists, but the believers are often the very same people. On online message boards dedicated to swapping conspiracy theories, many of the commentators who argue that Sandy Hook was a “false flag” operation actually see it as merely the latest in a long line of other government operations aimed at disarming Americans, such as the shooting in Aurora, Colo., and the Oklahoma City bombing.

Meanwhile, 9/11 truthers were quick to jump on the Sandy Hook bandwagon. One popular YouTube video purportedly offering “absolute proof” that the shooting was a hoax (338,000 views and counting) was produced by Operation Terror, a group that produced a series of 9/11 truther videos. Let’s Roll, an Internet forum created for discussing 9/11 theories, is rife with Sandy Hook threads.

Even birthers have gotten in on the mix. Orly Taitz, the dentist/attorney/real estate agent who helped push questions about Barack Obama’s birth certificate into the mainstream, has written a series of blog posts about how police are “lying” about Sandy Hook. Gary Wilmott, a paralegal from Los Angeles who has run a number of birther websites, has also “confirmed” that Sandy Hook was a “scam.”

And a number of readers have written in with their own stories. “My sister is a pretty smart person. She’s in med school, went to [a good Northeast liberal arts college], is reliably liberal … and yesterday she texts me asking if i had heard about these conspiracies and whether they’re true,” one said. A woman from Orange County, Calif., told us how a fellow mother on her children’s swim team told her that Peter and Nancy Lanza worked for the CIA and trained Adam to be a suicide gunman because President Obama wanted them to. “This was a typical suburban mom … I was thunderstruck,” she said. Another wrote in about his stepfather, who “believe[s] that Sandy Hook was some sort of operation.” “My step-dad is usually fairly logical, once shown proof he is able to change his mind, hence trying to weed out all these ‘alternative’ theories,” he added.

Of course, it’s impossible to get any kind of real handle on how many people out there actually believe this stuff, but studies show that belief in conspiracy theories is far more common than most people probably assume. For instance, we reported yesterday on a new survey showing that over 60 percent of Americans believe one conspiracy theory or another.

The true believers will probably never come around — confirmation bias will make them deaf to any conflicting evidence — but experts say the way to fight conspiracy theories is to prevent them from spreading. The only way we can do that is by first acknowledging that we have a problem.

Alex Seitz-Wald is Salon's political reporter. Email him at aseitz-wald@salon.com, and follow him on Twitter @aseitzwald.

Featured Slide Shows

Share on Twitter

Share on Facebook

1
of
14

Close

Fullscreen

Thumbnails

Previous

Next

13 of "Girls'" most cringeworthy sex scenes

Hannah and Adam, "Pilot"

One of our first exposures to uncomfortable “Girls” sex comes early, in the pilot episode, when Hannah and Adam “get feisty” (a phrase Hannah hates) on the couch. The pair is about to go at it doggy-style when Adam nearly inserts his penis in “the wrong hole,” and after Hannah corrects him, she awkwardly explains her lack of desire to have anal sex in too many words. “Hey, let’s play the quiet game,” Adam says, thrusting. And so the romance begins.

Previous

Next

13 of "Girls'" most cringeworthy sex scenes

Marnie and Elijah, "It's About Time"

In an act of “betrayal” that messes up each of their relationships with Hannah, Marnie and Elijah open Season 2 with some more couch sex, which is almost unbearable to watch. Elijah, who is trying to explore the “hetero side” of his bisexuality, can’t maintain his erection, and the entire affair ends in very uncomfortable silence.

Previous

Next

13 of "Girls'" most cringeworthy sex scenes

Marnie and Charlie, "Vagina Panic"

Poor Charlie. While he and Marnie have their fair share of uncomfortable sex over the course of their relationship, one of the saddest moments (aside from Marnie breaking up with him during intercourse) is when Marnie encourages him to penetrate her from behind so she doesn’t have to look at him. “This feels so good,” Charlie says. “We have to go slow.” Poor sucker.

Previous

Next

13 of "Girls'" most cringeworthy sex scenes

Shoshanna and camp friend Matt, "Hannah's Diary"

We’d be remiss not to mention Shoshanna’s effort to lose her virginity to an old camp friend, who tells her how “weird” it is that he “loves to eat pussy” moments before she admits she’s never “done it” before. At least it paves the way for the uncomfortable sex we later get to watch her have with Ray?

Previous

Next

13 of "Girls'" most cringeworthy sex scenes

Hannah and Adam, "Hard Being Easy"

On the heels of trying (unsuccessfully) to determine the status of her early relationship with Adam, Hannah walks by her future boyfriend’s bedroom to find him masturbating alone, in one of the strangest scenes of the first season. As Adam jerks off and refuses to let Hannah participate beyond telling him how much she likes watching, we see some serious (and odd) character development ... which ends with Hannah taking a hundred-dollar bill from Adam’s wallet, for cab fare and pizza (as well as her services).

Previous

Next

13 of "Girls'" most cringeworthy sex scenes

Marnie and Booth Jonathan, "Bad Friend"

Oh, Booth Jonathan -- the little man who “knows how to do things.” After he turns Marnie on enough to make her masturbate in the bathroom at the gallery where she works, Booth finally seals the deal in a mortifying and nearly painful to watch sex scene that tells us pretty much everything we need to know about how much Marnie is willing to fake it.

Previous

Next

13 of "Girls'" most cringeworthy sex scenes

Tad and Loreen, "The Return"

The only sex scene in the series not to feature one of the main characters, Hannah’s parents’ showertime anniversary celebration is easily one of the most cringe-worthy moments of the show’s first season. Even Hannah’s mother, Loreen, observes how embarrassing the situation is, which ends with her husband, Tad, slipping out of the shower and falling naked and unconscious on the bathroom floor.

Previous

Next

13 of "Girls'" most cringeworthy sex scenes

Hannah and the pharmacist, "The Return"

Tad and Loreen aren’t the only ones to get some during Hannah’s first season trip home to Michigan. The show’s protagonist finds herself in bed with a former high school classmate, who doesn’t exactly enjoy it when Hannah puts one of her fingers near his anus. “I’m tight like a baby, right?” Hannah asks at one point. Time to press pause.

Previous

Next

13 of "Girls'" most cringeworthy sex scenes

Hannah and Adam, "Role-Play"

While it’s not quite a full-on, all-out sex scene, Hannah and Adam’s attempt at role play in Season 3 is certainly an intimate encounter to behold (or not). Hannah dons a blond wig and gets a little too into her role, giving a melodramatic performance that ends with a passerby punching Adam in the face. So there’s that.

Previous

Next

13 of "Girls'" most cringeworthy sex scenes

Shoshanna and Ray, "Together"

As Shoshanna and Ray near the end of their relationship, we can see their sexual chemistry getting worse and worse. It’s no more evident than when Ray is penetrating a clothed and visibly horrified Shoshanna from behind, who ends the encounter by asking if her partner will just “get out of me.”

Previous

Next

13 of "Girls'" most cringeworthy sex scenes

Hannah and Frank, "Video Games"

Hannah, Jessa’s 19-year-old stepbrother, a graveyard and too much chatting. Need we say more about how uncomfortable this sex is to watch?

Previous

Next

13 of "Girls'" most cringeworthy sex scenes

Marnie and Desi, "Iowa"

Who gets her butt motorboated? Is this a real thing? Aside from the questionable logistics and reality of Marnie and Desi’s analingus scene, there’s also the awkward moment when Marnie confuses her partner’s declaration of love for licking her butthole with love for her. Oh, Marnie.

Previous

Next

13 of "Girls'" most cringeworthy sex scenes

Hannah and Adam, "Vagina Panic"

There is too much in this scene to dissect: fantasies of an 11-year-old girl with a Cabbage Patch lunchbox, excessive references to that little girl as a “slut” and Adam ripping off a condom to ejaculate on Hannah’s chest. No wonder it ends with Hannah saying she almost came.